Hi, I’m Emily Lupita, an American Latina artist & writer. I share about my latest art & writing projects here on my Substack. If you have a creative dream in your heart, I encourage you to keep creating. Keep going.
Summer 2026
Dear Compañeros de Camino (Traveling Companions),
This summer has been particularly productive and intensive for my creative projects. I am in the throes of finishing up four manuscripts that I’ve been working on since I graduated with my MFA in Creative Writing at Iowa State University almost 20 years ago.
I’ve posted several videos of my progress on Last Drop of a Holy Drink, my Mexico Memoir, on my Instagram and Facebook Page. I’m sharing my progress as I edit the current draft of the manuscript before querying.
I have excerpts from The Poet’s Daughter and the first 12 travel letters from Artist Travel Memoir posted here on my Substack.
I’m making videos now about the poems from Her Mexico Blurs, including explaining the background behind the MesoAmerican ancestral figures and motifs I use in the poems. Coming soon to my Instagram and Substack Notes.
There are several reasons I never finished my manuscripts. I was focused on a career in study abroad, an almost 20-year marriage, and staying busy as a mom after welcoming my two beautiful sons into the world, one of whom is profoundly autistic with an intellectual disability and requires specialized care.
Sure, there is legitimacy to the challenges these other worthy pursuits have presented to my writing progress. Like everyone, I made life choices and those choices had consequences for my creative projects. And other people made choices, too. And also, no one made choices. Life just happens in mysterious ways sometimes.
But it has become clear to me that the fundamental reason why I never finished before now is that I didn’t know myself enough to know why I was writing these books. I was writing in circles around the central issues. And those circles never ended. So I just kept circling, too afraid to go directly inward.
Then, over the last several years, I went on a journey right through the heart of that proverbial dark night of the soul. It wasn’t my first time in that heavy place, but it was the most extended and difficult time, by far. In that darkness, this time, I finally turned and faced the central issues I needed to face.
Doing so, I learned a great deal about who I am. I learned what I’m made of…to the core. I came to understand why I continue to work on these books, and what I want to say inside them. With great clarity.
I have a sense of gratitude for that dark time, now that I’m on the other side of it. Yes. But even more so, I’m grateful that I’ve emerged back into the light. It’s so much more joyful in the light. I’ve been getting so much more creative work done in the light. I hope I stay here for a long time.
I hope the brilliant rays of light shine on you, too, dear readers. Wherever you are on your journey…keep going.
May it be a blessing,
🧿 Emily Lupita
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